Two of Sega’s more niche games are being turned into movies

Sega has announced it’s producing movies for two of its more niche game franchises, Space Channel 5 and Comix Zone.

In a statement published on Friday, the Japanese games giant confirmed it’s partnered with production company Picturestart to develop film adaptations of the two 1990s games.

Comix Zone was released in 1995 for Sega Mega Drive / Genesis, with PC and Game Boy Advance ports following later. Meanwhile, music game Space Channel 5 received two Dreamcast games in the 90s, with a  PS2 port and GBA version following.

According to The Hollywood Reporter, Space Channel 5 “takes a comedy/dance view” of the 1999 game, and will tell the story of “a hapless fast-food worker who is recruited by a freedom reporter from the future to save the world from aliens using the one thing that unites all people on the planet: our love of silly viral dances.”

Meanwhile, Comix Zone “follows a jaded comic book creator and a young, queer writer of color who, when sucked into the final issue of his popular series, must put aside their differences to stop a dangerous supervillain from sowing complete destruction.”

Zone will reportedly be written by Mae Catt, whose credits include animated DC series Young Justice, and Dragons: The Nine Realm.

Space Channel 5 is being written by Barry Battles and Nir Paniry. Battles wrote and directed 2012 Billy Bob Thornton crime comedy The Baytown Outlaws, and Paniry wrote and directed Extracted, a sci-fi drama.

Sega’s Toru Nakahara, producer for the Sonic the Hedgehog movies, will reportedly produce the two adaptations.

Takumi Yoshinaga, the writer and game design director for the Space Channel 5 games, will reportedly be involved in the movie adaptation. Sega producer Kagasei Shimomura will join the team for Zone.

Sega has enjoyed box office success with its recent Sonic the Hedgehog films. The Sonic the Hedgehog 2 movie grossed over $400 million globally in under three months.

The live-action sequel, which was co-produced by Sega and Paramount Pictures, debuted in selected markets on March 30 and is currently the fourth-highest grossing video game adaptation of all time, narrowly ahead of Sony’s Uncharted movie, which was released in January.